SOUL

I don't understand what you are asking me, what do you mean by "content"?

@Ocean Actually, truth doesn't even exist until someone tries to speak it and no amount of capitalization changes that. It's sort of like how in the double slit experiment the photon is a wave until it is observed and then collapses into a particle. What is behaves one way unobserved and behaves another way observed. So truth is a subjectively assessed standard that we make objective comparisons to but each one of us subjectively experiences it and have our own standard.

Yes, deer.

Belief is just our trust that something exists or is true so a description can be a belief if we trust that it's the way it is. Truth is a comparison of what is asserted that it is compared to what actually is. So truth is a relative term that depends on a standard which may be subjectively attained but it is objectively compared.

A genuine transformative change would be to transcend the pendulum not just swing it.

There are merely your own beliefs from your own experience and are not everyone's, the sooner you realize this the sooner you stop trying to convince others that their experience is exactly like your own.

It really is as simple as you suggest, 'taking things personal' is using that natural passion you have for the beauty of life and instead making possessive about self. A simple practice would be to observe the inner life as you go through every day, watch how the egoic mind will instigate thoughts or stir emotions to influence in 'taking it personal'. Being aware of these initial impulses in us creates the opportunity for us to not reflexively agree with it, if we aren't aware of when it initially moves in us we may unconsciously endorse it so empower that identification with the emotional impulse. This way when we find ourselves in more heightened emotional interactions there is already a practiced self aware observation that can allow it not be blown 'out of proportion' in the mind so not be reacting in behavior. We can still feel the emotions without necessarily making it into more than it really is. Does this make any sense?

Building belief paradigms around sterile abstracts purged of any of life experience is just another form of conceptual self and it isn't any more right, better, enlightened or truth, it's just a preference of perspective but not necessarily a preferable one at that.

@Patang I agree that there are many ways that love can be expressed ranging from self interest to self less. Although forgive me for disagreeing on a subtle nuance but there really is no such thing as unconditional love. What you described in accepting, surrender, non-attachment and non targeting are all conditions placed on love with characteristics of selflessness. So the love that we are expressing can be a mix of both self-interest and selfless as well as it can be a mix of other emotional impulses including fear. Which is why we self inquire to discover the characteristics of our behaviors so we can express ourselves in a more selfless love if that is our intention.

Who? Haha!

Nice, yes, the body takes a million 'selfies' a day to paint a mosaic portrait that could be called 'self'. There is one facet that I would like to add to your description and that is love. It is love that pulls all of these many 'selfies' into one in us like a unifying embrace even if it is fear that clings onto it in attachment that doesn't want to let it go. Love will let go though, in love there is freedom and trust, this is how we can tell if we are embracing in love or are gripped in fear. Are we able to let go?

@Thanatos13 Haha!

Oh, it's just "freed to serve the integral function it is designed to serve" of "Divine individuation" and "without the notion the dream is not a dream".... oh sure, of course. I bet that cleared up it completely for them. Hehe

@MarkusSweden To be able to survive in this world we have evolved a pattern recognition that is comprised of a very sophisticated and complex imaginary system. We wouldn't be able navigate our environment successfully without retaining information about it from our experience and forming habituation that is suitable for it. With our inner life this pattern recognition is called the self which is really just a process of identifying ourselves in this world and yes, it's changes over time as well as in different circumstances. We can try to be authentic and 'true to ourselves' so to speak but every facet of our being isn't suitable for every circumstance we encounter. Expectation is limiting for sure but if we had no basis of understanding the environment we would perpetually be in a state of stress from an instinctual perspective. So our minds make many unconscious assumptions in every moment in every circumstance even if they are false perceptions so we can place our conscious attention on more specific tasks. What does that mean? Sometimes it's ok to have a 'work persona' that is different than one you may have off work and others for other situations but what to be aware of is to not behave in ways that are contradictory to your genuine nature to satisfy the expectations of others. This is what it is to be authentic even though this loosely knit 'self' may evolve over time as life runs it's course. Just be authentic to your genuine nature of being.... the mind snaps selfies a million times a day to compile a gallery of perception, that's what it does, we just don't have to obsess over the gallery of snap shots.

There's nothing(ness) to be afraid of..... be at peace.

this

I guess if you mean being a self suffering misery monger openly whining about life being worthless and meaningless so why prolong it at all is "worked out rather well" then yea..... so be it.

Do we doubt the sense of sight exists because it's constructed using a variety of biological processes in the body? What about smell, taste or hearing? If the sense of self doesn't exist because it's just biological processes then none of the senses exist, right? The self ceases to exist when the processes cease to function in producing it just the same way someone goes deaf or blind when those processes fail to produce the sense. The story the ego creates with that sense of self?..... Well, that's another story altogether. It is what it is.

@Thanatos13 Oxford states that definition, I just posted it here. What is essential? Being alive for a biological creature. What is being? Being a being. So the self pertains to the alive being. As the object of introspection OR reflexive action. Our body reflexively creates the sense of self, we don't decide to construct it, it's reflexive. It has nothing to do with control, behind the mask, pulling strings or any of that "story" being created to build the straw man. If the process that produces a sense of self doesn't exist, why does someone who has amnesia have it altered or damaged? The brain processes exist. What we experience as self conscious exists, maybe not as people believe it does in their straw man or ego story but it exists nonetheless. Although, you are welcome to reply again to tell me it doesn't but only proving it does in doing so.

It's all your self confessed stuff, taking drugs and hours of meditation, what's to assume when you speak openly about it? You also spends hours on camera saying "you you you", should you consider that maybe that is all YOUR stuff and not the audience's? I comprehend your belief paradigm is stuck on dualism otherwise the word Truth wouldn't be uttered as often as it is by you. Don't fall into your own trap of making it about me or any of the viewing audience and forum participants as you so readily do. It is what it is.

Continuing to add attributes to the straw man doesn't change what a "self" is actually defined as. "a person's essential being that distinguishes them from others, especially considered as the object of introspection or reflexive action" That is what the self is so direct your evidence towards what the self is defined as, not in straw 'self' building.

So when were you going to provide actual evidence that the self doesn't exist? Just so you have an understanding what the self is by definition and not the interpretation straw man you think you can defeat. Let's see you prove that self exists again by replying in defense of ........

Ah yes, your true nature comes out, glad to see you show your genuine intentions This is how you started the thread: It exists and you have acknowledged it exists by saying it is a process because, yes, a process exists. Especially so when it is a biological process that is performed involuntarily as a function of the body. You keep proving the self exists with every reply Explain with details about why you and the people you parrot believe this biological process "doesn't actually exist".

So a process doesn't exist? You mean like the scientific method is a process of discovery doesn't exist? Ok, you want to now say it's not a "thing" but a "process" and there are definite characteristics that define what the process of the scientific method of discovery is which make it what it is even if it's not a thing but a process. The same thing... er... process of showing how the self exists as a method of creating identity that successfully sustains itself as a biological being in the world. Wow, you are doing a pretty good job of proving this Tom guy wrong. You should feel proud of your self.

You said it yourself, it's a construct to understand the world around us. That's a thing, it's constructed, it has individual characteristics and is used by us to understand the world. So, therefore, it exists. Don't you feel better about yourself now? You proved Thomas Metzinger wrong.